Now, a new study suggests that coffeefans can make their drink taste sweeter by simply changing the color of theircups.

Scientists claim that blue and glass mugs,which are popular in some coffee shops, can reduce coffee's bitterness, withoutany need for sugar, and that coffee drunk from white cups tastes the bitterest.

    To prove their claims, the researchersinvited 36 volunteers and used three different colored cups— blue, white andtransparent glass—to do an experiment.

    In the experiment, coffee consumed fromthe white cup was found to taste less sweet when compared to the other twocolored cups, while the blue cup made the coffee taste the sweetest.

    The scientists believe that the colorbrown may be associated with coffee's bitterness because coffee in a white cupappears the brownest and tastes the bitterest.

  “Our study clearly shows that the colorof a coffee cup does influence the perceived (感受到的) taste and flavor of coffee,” said DrGeorge Doorn of Federation University Australia, “but the potential effects maybe different between a one-time purchase and a return customer.”

  “Anyhow, the effect of the color of thecup on the flavor of the coffee suggests that café owners, baristas (服务员), aswell as coffee cup manufacturers should carefully consider the color of theircups, ” he added.

    However, the idea that color can alterthe taste of food and drink is not new.

    A study published last year revealedthat red, strawberry-flavored mousse (慕斯蛋糕) served on a white plate was rated as10 percent sweeter and 15 percent more flavorous than the same food presentedon a black plate.

    We humans spend about one-third of our lives asleep. This may sound like a lot of time, but it is not wasted. Sleep not only helps us stay healthy but it also helps our brains remember. Our brains need good sleep to remember what we do and learn during the other two thirds of our lives when we are awake.

    Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have found that sleep helps improve brain performance by shrinking(收缩)synapses in the brain. A synapse is the area where cells pass messages to other cells.

    Scientist Chiara Cirelli is a leader at the school's Center for Sleep and Consciousness. She told the reporter that sleep is when the human brain mixes information it has learned while awake into its general collection of knowledge. Meanwhile, the brain forgets unimportant details. This forgetting is important. It makes space for new learning and new memories.

    Cirelli said that the Centers research began with this hypothesis(假设): We sleep so that our brain can repair and refresh itself. She said the idea seems simple and reasonable. However, testing and discovering how it works has been extremely difficult.

    Synapses are only about 20-40 nanometers(纳米)wide. The team began their study by measuring the size of the synapses to look for changes in these already tiny spaces between nerve cells. Cirelli says the process(过程) is difficult because"all the actual measurements of the synapses have to be done by hand." The team had to wait until improvements in laboratory technology made it possible to see these tiny changes. A University of Wisconsin press release called the research a"huge job." Many research specialists worked for four years to photograph, rebuild and study certain areas of a mouse brain. The report also said the scientists measured 6,920 synapses.

    Cirelli says they found that our synapses shrink as our brains clean themselves during sleep. We wake up refreshed and ready to fill those synapses with new information. The research findings are the result of years of hard work at the University of Wisconsin Madison. The researchers published their findings in the journal Science.

    Can you be too beautiful? It is hardly a problem that most of us have to bother — as much as we might like to dream that it were the case.

    Yet the blessings and curses of beauty have been a long-standing interest in psychology. Do those blessed with shiny faces and an attractive body live in a cloud of appreciation — or does it sometimes pay to be ordinary?

    At the most basic level, beauty might be thought to carry a kind of halo (光环) around it; we see that someone has one good quality, and by association, our deep mind may assume that they have other good ones too.

    Even in the courts, a pleasing appearance can work its magic. Attractive criminals are likely to get less strict sentences, or to escape punishment entirely; attractive plaintiffs (原告), meanwhile, are more likely to win their case and get bigger financial settlements. "It's an effect seen everywhere," says Walker.

    But if beauty pays in most circumstances, there are still situations where it can have opposite results. While attractive men may be considered better leaders, for instance, hidden sexist prejudices (偏见) can work against attractive women, making them less likely to be hired for high-level jobs that require power. And as you might expect, good-looking people of both sexes run into envy — one study found that if you are interviewed by someone of the same sex, they may be less likely to employ you if they judge that you are more attractive than they are.

    More worryingly, being beautiful or handsome could harm your medical care. We tend to link good looks to health, meaning that illnesses are often taken less seriously when they affect the good-looking. When treating people for pain, for instance, doctors tend to take less care over the more attractive people.

    Ultimately, scientists point out that focusing too much on your appearance can itself be harmful if it creates stress and anxiety — even for those already blessed with good looks. "If you are crazy about attractiveness, it may affect your experience and interactions," she says. It's an outdated saying, but no amount of beauty can make up for a bad personality. As the writer Dorothy Parker put it so elegantly: "Beauty is only skin deep, but ugly goes clean to the bone."

    Go to NYU Precollege Summer Program

    Make the most of your summer vacation with this six-week academic summer camp for high school juniors and seniors. Earn college credits, explore New York City(NYC), and experience academic and student life at New York University(NYU), Scholarships are available.

    Participants

    NYU Precollege summer camp offers rising high school juniors and seniors the opportunity to experience academic and student life at New York University. Teens take college-level courses for academic credits which may be applied to a future degree. Residential（住校的）and non-residential choices are available.

    What to do

    Participants take credit-bearing（学分计的）courses with current college students. Courses are available in over 36 subjects. Students can explore the archeological（考古学的）history of New York City, visit major New York sports equipment, learn the business of sports management, begin to master the Chinese language, practice the art of news reporting, or dig into the service industry while going behind the scenes at Manhattan hotels and restaurants.

    Additionally, students have the opportunity to participate in free noncredit seminars taught by NYU's distinguished writing experts. The seminars offer students an opportunity to improve writing skills and focus on college-level writing.

    Harvest Outside the classroom, NYU Precollege offers seminars regarding the college admissions and application process, as well as a variety of on-and-off-campus social event and activities. NYU Precollege summer camp allows outstanding teens to get a taste of college while still having time to work or volunteer outside of school, and enjoy the summer vacation.

    Each year, hundreds of thousands of wild animals around the world are killed in trophy hunting—the organized shooting of animals for pleasure. The hunters then bring parts of the animal home with them as their "trophy" to remember the hunting.

    Trophy hunters pay big money to kill animals. Some of the money goes to helping wildlife protection. Trophy hunting also attracts business, which encourages people to preserve land and breed(饲养) animals that would otherwise be endangered. Cathy Dean, head of the Save the Rhino Charity, says that at the start of the 1900s there were only 50–100 southern white rhinos. Now, there are around 18,000. This is partly because some of them were raised specially for trophy hunting.

    But things don't usually go on one way. According to WWF, elephant populations have fallen from 1.3 million to just over 400,000 since the 1980s. Over the same period, hunters from around the world have taken home more than 100,000 African elephant trophies. Trophy hunting is not illegal(非法的) but unfair on the animals. In 2015, Cecil the lion was shot by a US trophy hunter. Cecil was a beloved lion in Zimbabwe, Africa. Cecil was lured with bait(诱饵), shot with an arrow and struggled in blood for more than ten hours before his hunters tracked and finished killing him. His son, Xanda, met a similar fate two years later.

    Cecil's death caused worldwide outrage and protests(反抗) against trophy hunting. Countries including Australia, France and the Netherlands banned(禁止) the import of lion trophies—they stop hunters from being allowed to bring home parts of the animal they kill. They believe that people will stop trophy hunting because the activity might lose its attraction if hunters can't bring their trophies home.

    The UK Government said that it would consider a ban on trophy-hunting imports by 2017, but no action had been taken. In April 2019, a letter by protesters against trophy hunting was sent to the UK government asking to ban trophy-hunting imports. On 7 May, the official in charge of the environment, Michael Gove, said that the UK would not ban the imports for the time being. This left the world in a state of a shock. Hopefully the UK will place a ban on trophy-hunting imports, which would be an important message and inspire others to treat animals better. We're waiting for the day to come.

    Nature has provided us with many kinds of resources. It is like a great magician(魔术师), creating wonders on Earth. One of them is the Amazon rainforest, the world's largest and home to millions of plants and animals. Nicknamed" the lungs of our planet", it produces about one-fifth of Earth's oxygen. However, this wonderful natural wonder is now in danger.

    Thousands of fires have broken out in Brazil, endangering much of the rainforest. These flames have lasted several weeks and are believed to be the "most intense" in almost ten years, according to BBC News.

    The Amazon has seen a large number of fires in 2019. Between January and August, there were over 74,000 fires – the highest number since 2013, the BBC reported.

    Forest fires are common during the dry season, which runs from July to October. They are usually caused by natural events like lightning. However, most of the fires this year are believed to be caused by farmers, who use fire as a traditional part of tropical agriculture(农业) to clean land, reported CNN.

    "It's the best time to burn because the plants are dry. Farmers wait for the dry season and they start burning and clearing the areas so that their cattle can have grass," wrote CNN meteorologist Haley Brink.

    The disaster has raised concern(关注) around the world. The Amazon rainforest is important for preventing climate change, said the BBC, absorbing millions of tons of carbon annually. When trees are cut down or burned, the rainforest's ability to absorb carbon is reduced.

    Brazilian climate expert Carlos Nobre told Reuters he's worried. If more than 20 percent of the ecosystem is destroyed, the Amazon rainforest could reach a "tipping point (临界点)", where the thick jungle will turn into a tropical savannah(大草原).

    Nobre warned that it is not far off, with between 15 and 17 percent of the rainforest having already been destroyed.

    The Brazilian government has sent soldiers to fight the fires. Many people have offered their support and called for recovery efforts. For example, Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, said he wanted to donate money and US Actor Leonardo DiCaprio's environmental charity, Earth Alliance, created a donation fund to help deal with the disaster.

    The public are also encouraged to donate to charities concerned with rainforest protection. "Every little bit helps in a bad situation like this," commented Gizmodo.